I’ve always loved movies and always will. Although I’ve gone through periods of time in my life when I drifted away from the big screen, after some time I would find myself being tugged back towards that infamous silver screen, and for good reason. Its funny how during those times when I started watching movies again, certain characteristics of movie watching had changed, and new eras of movie watching had evolved and become the going trend.

I remember traveling to my parent’s home back in the mid eighties for Christmas. I don’t think I had seen a movie for several years leading up to the trip. While at my folk’s home in Hamburg New York, I sat in their living room and watched a pay channel viewing of Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Arc. Also, during the trip, I, my brothers, sisters and other family members went to see the movie E.T. This was the first time I could ever remember crying while watching a movie. Call me crazy, but this experience stayed with me, and with the purchase of our first VCR player a few months later, I was hooked to movies once again.

The second time I fell away from watching movies was back in 2010 when I lost my sight. Granted there was a few forms of distraction going on, and these life changing tangents held me back from a life long passion of mine for a couple of years. I never thought I would ever be able to enjoy films or television really. Now don’t get me wrong as my wife stepped in and became the best damn describer that a billy goat ever had. She mastered the art of pause, describe and resume, and did it with ease. Unfortunately, this would turn a two hour movie into a two hour and forty-five minute experience. It also gobbled up one pair of double A batteries after another. Poor little remote. It never had a chance.

I can hear a distant rendition of Taps being played somewhere in the middle of a lush, green field.

Now then, where was I?

Oh ya. I didn’t ever find a way to thank her properly for helping me with description, and to this day, I’m sorry to say, but the movie watching experience just seemed to be missing something. I finally figured out that what I thought was the most important ingredient of all, vision, was the missing link between myself and my past passions for movies, but there wasn’t anything I could do about it but try to absorb, adapt and advance with the tools I still had control of.

During the year 2013, I kept hearing about described video service, or DVS as it’s known. I sort of poo poo’d it, never thinking that I would learn how to get these little gems of accessibility, nor did I really want to. I became comfortable with the way things were, and you know me, a pitiful creature of habit.

I had been using my iPod, along with an app that had access to a podcast that included described movies and television shows. I started using it more and more over the 2013/14 winter, and finally, found out how to acquire described audio files of movies.

The format was an mp3, which I was used to using with my iPod, and so, I uploaded a movie to my device, and instantly, I was hooked.

Let me tell you, this new technology has brought me back to my love of the big screen, and also television. I am full of gratitude for those who have developed this technology, and all I can say is thank you.

The silver screen is so much more than a visual experience. It’s about the music score, the wonderful array of audio styling’s and formattings. It’s about well developed story lines that accent a point in time, and with an ease similar to a summer’s breeze, being able to hear it described to you is to reignite a deep seeded passion that could never hope of being completely eliminated.

I hope that anyone who is visually impaired can some day be able to experience what I have come to love. I hope that this technology has only just begun. I hope that my audible ability to create visual images in my imaginative mind is just getting started.

I hope that you enjoyed this post half as much as I have enjoyed writing about it.

Thanks for stopping by, and go ahead and live a little, or better yet, I dare you to live a lot!